[Schilkeman]

As a bit of an art appréciateur, in all its mediums, I have a kind of multi-step process for dealing with problematic artists. The first, being related to the second, is the issue of time. How long ago was the artist alive? While I believe morality does not have a temporal dimension (we were telling people to be kind to one another thousands of years ago), the cultural mores of a time period can at least explain the context of what we would now consider difficult behavior.

The sieve of time sifts all art, which is related to my second point: is the art worth keeping such that I can live with the artist’s problems? Will people still care about this in 100 years? A thousand years? Who knows, but when I look at something like Harry Potter, and see the way people still talk about Mallory, or Shelly, or Baum, I think, sure, Harry Potter will outlive its author. Will people still care about The Cosby Show then? I’m not sure. Comedy often ages like meat.

Which brings me to my final point. How much of the author’s problems are present in the work? For Potter, I read only the good things Rowling wishes to see in the world, and find its basic morality strong and defendable. When Cosby gets pedantic on The Cosby Show, I can no longer hand wave away its respectability politics by thinking “at least he practiced what he preached.” There’s not enough antisemitism in Wagner for me to write off his work only for that reason (I have other reasons lol). This is the most subjective part of the process. Pharos were inherently immoral, but the pyramids still stand. I can appreciate the immense skill that went into making them, even if they were built under duress. The lesser works disappear in the sand, and no one cares.